Almost daily, over the course of a year, biologist David George Haskell visited a small patch of ground in a remnant of old growth Tennessee forest, disturbing as little as possible. With grace and empathy he recorded his observations in The Forest Unseen, A Year's Watch in Nature. The book is a series of essays on the complex interconnections of the forest and its inhabitants, spinning a fascinating web of biology, ecology and poetry to explain the science that binds us all into ecosystems that have been cycling for eons. Hosted by Stephanie Potter
"David Haskell’s The Forest Unseen is a ‘nature book,’ and a great one, but it’s also and less obviously a book about human nature. You can’t read its lyrical, tactile prose without confronting the whole question of our place in the natural order, and of what we’re doing here. If we want to last much longer on this planet, we’ll have to learn to think differently and more deeply about those things, and Haskell can be one of our guides.” —John Jeremiah Sullivan, author of Pulphead
The Forest Unseen was winner of the 2013 Best Book Award from the National Academies, finalist for the 2013 Pulitzer Prize in General Nonfiction and winner of the 2013 Reed Environmental Writing Award. David George Haskell is a professor of biology at the University of the South and was named the Carnegie-CASE Professor of the Year in Tennessee in 2009. In addition to his scholarly work, he has published essays and poetry. He lives in Sewanee, Tennessee. Visit his blog at davidhaskell.wordpress.com
- KBOO